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Memory Alpha talk:Retroactive continuity policy
Draft This policy proposal would expand upon, and ultimately replace, the "dealing with conflicting information" in the content policy and the brief snipit in the tolerance in valid resources at the resource policy. I think it address some issues with the way we currently deal with retcons, mostly category stuff, while giving a better and fuller explanation of what should be done when dealing with them, which is currently spread out in discussions across a number of pages. - 22:15, January 14, 2017 (UTC) :Well, at least ever since TOS remastered it is undeniable that retcons is something we have to deal with, and we should indeed have a policy page on it. But I got to say, some of what you propose makes me slightly nervous. Long post, sorry. :For example, you suggest cutting the note at at MA:RESOURCE to be replaced by this page. To me that seems neither necessary nor such a great idea, because it kinda turns the logic upside down: we were previously asked to make sure that "valid resources should be construed so as not to be in conflict, unless no other explanation is reasonable under the circumstances" "to the greatest extent possible", suggesting that retcons should only be assumed if there really really was no other way. With all that language gone there and moved to a preamble of this new page on what to do with retcons, the perspective flips and now the proscribed action is to discard stuff, unless those conditions are into play - making it weaker even if the language doesn't change. :I think in reality, that MA:RESOURCE language is applicable to a all kinds of conflicts, many of which have been solved without ever putting it in the framework of just discarding one of the conflicting references. Before the remasterings started coming around and we started using the r-word, we nearly always found other solutions. (Although I might be biased on all this, because I still think it is possible to interpret Whorfin Dax as something else then a retconned reference) And I really like the ethic of going as far as possible when dealing with seemingly contradictory resources, because getting as much information from the shows on the encyclopedia as possible without cutting some because it doesn't fit well with the rest to me is one of the most triumphant ways we are trying to be the most definitive, accurate, and accessible encyclopedia on this universe. But this, I'm worried that it will be taken as a licence to throw difficult stuff out more often. :Significantly but not completely related to that, I think the second section could use some work. For example, the sentence "In these cases, the valid resource with a higher precedence can, but does not always have to, be given slightly greater evidentiary weight for the purposes of writing the article from an in-universe standpoint." is just a monster. (and it's not on precedence of valid sources I'm stumbling) :Thirdly and unrelated to the above, are categories like Category:Raymond family (retconned) really necesary? It seems like they would mostly be tiny categories. And we don't have an incomplete mirror of the category tree with "(unreferenced)" behind it in the unreferenced material category. The Category:Retconned material on the other hand I think is a stroke of brilliance. (though maybe there's a better name to be found for it). Then again, you have a much greater insight in categories then me, so I'd be happy to be schooled on this. -- Capricorn (talk) 23:20, January 20, 2017 (UTC) First off, let me assure you that the intent here isn't to change the assumption that no conflict exists, only to change, and give better instructions, on what happens when there is no reasonable way around a conflict. "Ultimately replace" meant a link to this page, not necessarily "removing" that text entirely. The text would be trimmed a bit though, but I have more on that below. The sentence you point out in the second part is indeed a bit of a monster, and has cause problems before, but it's already part of the resource policy, and does serve a function. It's added here as well because while each policy, content, resource, and this, is suppose to lean on and work with the others, each page should be understandable in and of itself, and that bit of text does have applications here. Section two is the part I'm mostly having trouble with myself, since I deliberately wanted to have examples of retcons outside of the remastered stuff, which I think is more or less cut and dry except for stuff like the blue alert thing. I also didn't want to steal the FAQ's "79 decks" example, but it's difficult to pull good examples with so few options, and that Dax is already considered a retcon. As for the categories, when I first suggested retconned material, I thought I was being pretty clever too, but in practice I've become convinced it isn't working. First off, it doesn't work well with background information, and not all retcons need, or should have, a separate page. Building a list at retroactive continuity and removing the category isn't as easy to maintain as just using a category, which is why I've purposed the hidden category. Second, retcons are still "canon", just not "in-universe", which is why being able to find them from the "canon, in-universe" categories is important. It's equally important that they not be directly in those "in-universe" categories too. Unreferenced and deleted material isn't "canon" or "in-universe", so the same considerations don't apply. Make no mistake though, the intent is to mirror the category tree as necessary, with each page having a retcon version of the categories it would have if it was in-universe. Those categories would be in their in-universe counterpart, and the retconned category. This will remove almost everything from the retcon category directly, as it would now be a super category for all the others. This will also create a number of small or single entry categories, but it's the only solution that's realistically manageable that I could think of. For the sake of clarity, the will retain its title of being a pain in the ass and won't be placed into a sub-category, for reasons I can go into in detail about if asked, but I just wanted to be up front about that, in case it becomes an issue later. - 01:49, January 21, 2017 (UTC) :You make some very good points on the categories. Part of me says, just keep the retconned material in its normal categories and also add the retcon category for easy identification, but I suppose that's a bit mad. Ok, you've won me over on that one. :Regarding the other stuff, it's less that I see something objectionable on the text, but rather that something is off with the focus, that the structure of the thing introduces a sort of bias. The article never really defines what (for our purposes) a retcon is. The three cases seem like they're just that, but that's misleading. Rather what the article says is: 1) This is about how to deal with retcons, which pose a problem. 2) The whole "try to reconcile conflicting information" bit 3) In these three cases, you may need to pick and choose. If you ignore 1), which really is just an intro, the text seems more like a conflicting information policy, saying in which cases you need to do what. But it's a retcon policy, therefore suggesting that go-to action when dealing with conflicting information is to figure out if one of the bits is eligible for discarding or not - In the part we've had some long painful discussions on very complicated subjects, that nonetheless came op with good sensible solutions. I just wonder how that would have gone if the option of just discarding that one clearly problematic piece of dialog would have been in the minds of participants more. -- Capricorn (talk) 07:23, January 25, 2017 (UTC) To be fair, this would kinda be the "dealing with conflicts in content and resources" policy, where I've only really fleshed out the "what happens if no common sense solution exists to allow both things to be true" part. Feel free to edit the text as you deem necessary to solve the bias towards just retconning something out, as opposed to "if you have to retcon something out", which is what this is suppose to be. - 14:05, January 25, 2017 (UTC) Not to rush anyone, but I am planning to upgrade this to a full policy, and make the changes to the content and resource policies, sometime in the next week or so. If you have been putting off looking at this, now would be the time. - 16:24, February 3, 2017 (UTC) POV clarification Do I understand the policy correctly that articles about retconned things should be written from an in-universe POV, with a bginfo/appenix explaining why it is a retcon article? Because the articles about the original planets from the commercial transport database like Alpha Echevarria IV are currently written from a realworld POV like those about things from deleted scenes. Kennelly (talk) 14:46, February 2, 2017 (UTC) :You can write them from an in-universe POV if you like, or simply keep them written as such, but you don't have to. Retconned information is "canon", but not in-universe. - 15:57, February 2, 2017 (UTC) ::I'd suggest that if we're considering it "canon" (even if no longer "active"), we deal with it in an "in-universe" POV. -- sulfur (talk) 16:03, February 2, 2017 (UTC) :That would be my suggestion as well. The only article that has to be written from a RW POV is the Melbourne. - 16:11, February 2, 2017 (UTC)